'63 Safari - It 'Bee' Traded (#8671)

[goransons]

The vent location is going to help in this repair, giving me more flex than I might have otherwise. I've gained enough access to check out the situation. I think I can drop about 4 feet of the ceiling from the street side and gain enough access to get to what I need. I have a lead locally on some scraps of bow that I can splice.

Zep you were correct on the rolling action, unfortunately not on the bow, but the spacer block (seen on its side in the photo. Oddly enough this was not riveted in place to inner and outter skin, just a tab to each bow. The bow itself is crunched.

I feel confident I can carefully cut out about a 2 foot section and replace it, while removed gain enough access from inside to help the end cap dent out, I can almost pull it with a suction cup but the bent rib prohibits it from popping back. It looks horrible from above, had the trailer for over a month before I even found it, and only because I was on my deck and happened to look down and think "what the heck?"

Did my best to photo from within, the crossmember with the grommet in it is the inner frame for the hehr roof vent, about 2 square feet of metal pulled back to get this much access.

Middle crossmember is on its side, gab to the front of the trailer and snug to the rear (notice to complete lack of rivet holes to hold it to anything).

When splicing, I have some 1.5" x 1/8 aluminum plate, if shapped to fit inside the contour of the rib, backed on both sides with rivets through, say 3 on each side of the cut, will that be sufficient?

[Zeppelinium]

Originally Posted by goransons

...When splicing, I have some 1.5" x 1/8 aluminum plate, if shapped to fit inside the contour of the rib, backed on both sides with rivets through, say 3 on each side of the cut, will that be sufficient?

Scott, good job on getting access!

The rib repair only needs to consider the compression forces in the rib. The 1/8" material is more than adequate, as long as it's restrained in a way to prevent column failure, eg, the piece "folds" as it's compressed. I think I saw that you bought a shrinker. If so, make a curved piece of "L" bracket to pick up the existing rivets in the skin-to-rib joint and attach the 1/8" piece to flange of that "L" piece.

Three rivets is probably enough from a strength consideration, but you need to keep the new piece in-plane with the flange of the existing rib. That would require two rows of rivets, so a minimum of four on each end.

The shear strength of a solid 1/8" (AN470AD 4-X, hard) rivet is 337 lbs. Rivets. The soft version (AN470A 4-X) is about 40% of that, or 142 lbs.

The shear strength of an aluminum pop rivet is 155 lbs. Marson Aluminum Pop-Rivet with Aluminum Mandrel

The question is, how much force is induced in the rib when you hit a pot hole at 70 mph and the trailer flexes? Over and over. I've had some damage to a partition that tells me that the floor to ceiling dimension changes at least an inch as the tube shape squishes towards oval when the frame flexes. In such a case, the compression forces in the rib are probably pretty large. I'd be concerned that 4 pop rivets, providing only 600 lbs of shear capability, would be highly stressed. I'll ask AEROWOOD to take a look at this post and see what he says.

Zep

[goransons]

tPlease ignore above where I said I won't take down the ceiling, I hate being wrong...

I removed more rivets to gain more access to work, and when I pulled the skin back, the ceiling rained mouse droppings and shredded newspaper. It became very clear I needed to clean that out and replace insulation. The game plan is to keep the center seam with its solid rivets intact. To drop it 2/3 (side to side) I just need to finish removing the trim on the two front vents and drop the center light fixture. I can take the opportunity to install the additional bracing for the AC and look over wires before putting it back up. First photo shows how much I have dropped so far.

From the roof the center of the trailer, just about over the kitchen drops a bit, and with the skin down you can see why, that bow only goes about 40% across then stops in the middle. Definately will add some material here before putting an AC unit up there. So much for leaving the ceiling alone.

Second photo, I managed to cut out the damaged bow section and have a bow from a donor trailer a friend has that will be cut to replace the damaged section. I had to sheer off the blind rivets from the end cap segments into the bow, and managed to get most of the main dent to pop out on its own. It definately won't be perfect but will show the history of the trailer a bit, and only be visable from the roof anyway.

Third photo shows the initial results from popping the dent out. The one in the end cap is still oil canning back down, but I think if I remove another rivet or two and loose the silicone all over that area that it will have enough room to move that it too will pop up.

I need to make a template of the next bow forward to make sure I have the right contour for the patch, and plan to do that after lunch.

[VIKING]

That's looking good Scott. I was just doing the same thing a few weeks ago
I also had to remove my end caps and ceiling. Not because of rodents, but because I thought I would need to rewire the whole trailer. Now that I can see the wires I almost wish I hadn't. They are in great shape and the original installation was done really well. All grommeted and secured, not like some of the horror stories I've read about here. Here's a shot of my ceiling taking up all of my workspace. I couldn't get it out in one piece no matter how I tried so I ended up drilling out the solid rivets and taking it out in pieces. I expected to have need of a buck rivetting set-up eventually for the rivets around the door, so I'll be putting new solid ones back in before it gets re-installed.
You're pace is impressive. Between the weather and my schedule, I've gotten about two hours in on mine in the last three weeks
Rich

[utee94]

Hey Rich, you're doing fine. I believe that particular piece of aluminum might have come in through the front window rather than the door, but don't know for sure.

Scott, sorry about the "hidden damage" but it sounds like you're handling it nicely. It's a good thing this task, and this trailer, fell to you-- there are other who are less experienced who might balk at it (looking in the mirror right now! ).

As for me, I'm on poop tank duty this weekend. It has not been the most pleasant task I can tell you that much.


-Marcus

[danalee]

Mouse poop, gad its everywhere!!!!!

[Frank's Trailer Works]

So which is worst? Mouse or rat?

[utee94]

I was lucky enough not to have any mouse turds OR rat turds. My issues are of the human variety...



-Marcus

[flyfshr]

Originally Posted by utee94

I was lucky enough not to have any mouse turds OR rat turds. My issues are of the human variety...

Uh-oh. What does that say about the former owners?

Brad
FF

[PeeWee]

Originally Posted by 62overlander

So which is worst? Mouse or rat?
Attachment 75857

Elephants? Of course, they never forget...they will find you and give and give and give.

[PeeWee]

Originally Posted by utee94

I was lucky enough not to have any mouse turds OR rat turds. My issues are of the human variety...



-Marcus

The scatalogical discussion goes on and on and must be done sitting down.

[goransons]

As Rich found, our electrical was very well done, and is in very good shape. I am taking the time to check all lengths of wire and taping any nicks in wires, replacing dried out rubber grommets etc.

I ran out of time yesterday to photo what I got done, or close to done anyway. Marcus, the only thing I'm experienced with on these is getting good advice from the right people...

An interesting fact though, our 1963 bows are smaller stock than 64 bow material. The convenient part of that, the newer bow material snuggly slips over the old bow material. The 12" section of removed bow was replaced with a 24" segment. The only downside was that the damaged segment of the bow was on the street side, and on the donor bow, that same area had but nearly completely cut through by the factory for a sewer vent location.

This meant to match the angle I had to cut the piece I needed from the curb side, which meant it was backwards. Basically that made an "O" out of the bow. To attach, 4 stainless bolts and washers through the two bow sections to hold the "O" together, the old bow sitting inside the new. Then the rivets above and below pass through the new and old bow. I'll try to get a few photos snapped today. Weather was 51 degrees yesterday, woke up to snow this morning, and now its raining, I guess that's a good way to check for leaks.

I'm hoping to later this week finish sealing all the seams from below in the ceiling, install new insulation and some additional roof supports for the AC unit. Also going to take advantage of the rivets missing, and reinstall the ceiling temporarily with a few screws here and there so I can sand the upper panels down to remove the layers of paint. At least I won't have to figure out how to remove the latex paint from around the rivets that way.

I am amazed that mice were able to get up everywhere. The huge hole in the kitchen floor, and in turn huge opening in the wall from the hacked up battery door and furnace openings must have been their way in, and all the gaps in the bows and ribs must have been their way through. Tunnels everywhere in the insulation, must have been interesting sleeping in there. Good news is that there was no evidence in the end caps so far, so those get to stay up.

[goransons]

I didn't get the side bolts in this morning as planned. Helped Wally across town track down an electrical short in his 70 caravanner this morning and ended up a work today for a few hours.

Anyway, here is a photo of the splice in place, with the top (skin to bow) connection made. The red arrows indicate where the existing bow was cut, the black arrows show where the splice on the bow ends. Each area of the splice has 6 rivets on the top flange (passing through the end cap aluminum, the sheet material and through both ribs). The bottom area of the splice will also have 6 rivets, 3 that pass through the fiberglass end cap and both bows (hidden by the interior sheet metal) and 3 from the interior sheet metal.

Also will be 3 bolts passing front to back through the web of the bow (at each overlap) to help further tie them together. Just need to finish the bolt, feed my wire through the grommet and start reinsulating. I am confident this is strong enough to withstand even abusive airstream use. (keep in mind the new bow material fully overlaps on 3 sides the existing bow.)

[Aerowood]

good job

[goransons]

Thanks Kip, wasn't how I had planned to do it, but it worked out ok I think.

[VIKING]

Scott, I was having a couple of persistent leaks in the front of my Safari. one at the top of the front window and one bad one at the front top corner of the jalousie window, by the door. The reason I'm unloading this misery on you is that the leaks were one leak, at the front ceiling vent on the curb side. Not in the vent itself, but in the C channel that runs alongside them. If you still have your ceiling panels down you might want to check out the rivets that go through these C channels and through the roof panels. I found my leak there and followed it to both leaks that I had found earlier. The weird thing was that it all looked fine. The rivets were all there and I couldn't see water anywhere. The rivets have become loose and I can turn a couple of them with my fingers. The water was traveling between the C channels and the outer skins until it came to the rib at the top of the front fiberglass dome, then it traveled down from there depending on the attitude the trailer was sitting at. Upon further inspection, I found that alot of the rivets along that line were loose, all the way to the back of the trailer. These leaks and future leaks would not have been found if I had not taken the ceiling down.
Oh! and there were lots of mouse trails in my front dome, but these were the really clean mice. not like their nasty inlaws that lived in the bellypan!

(The pic is of the C channels on the sides of the front vent, These were loose)

Good luck! Rich

[goransons]

Thanks for the lead Rich. We had 2 full days of nasty rain, and I had a few leaks in the back from rivets I hadn't replaced yet from removing the back window awning stuff (the snow had stopped the polishing process.)

Did you drill and replace those loose rivets or some other means of sealing them? I do plan to do as much interior sealing as I can and double check for leaks before reinsulating.

[VIKING]

I need to get a riveter and more powerful compressor to fix them right, so They're probably dripping water right now. The way I found them was I bumped one of the rails while moving a wire out of my way, and I got a faceful of water. I was able to wiggle them from side to side about 1/4" they were so loose. I found two other ones that were also loose further back. I will probably just seal the seams again and re-set the existing rivets, unless there's a reason not to. I haven't heard of anyone re-setting rivets before, so I'd better look into it a little.

We've had rain the last two weekends here, very heavy at times. It's hard to get anything done. I've just started with a wire cup on my frame. That's about all I can do until it starts to dry out a little. Even painting it would be impossible right now.

Happy Streaming, Rich

[Frank's Trailer Works]

I will first say that I do not know for certain, but I do not believe you can re set the rivets. You will probably need to drill them and buck in some new ones. I would not trust the rivet to be able to bite down hard once it has wiggled around and gotten some slop to it. I bet Aerowood know the answer for sure.

[VIKING]

That's what I expected to hear. The rivet head could be almost cut off from the panels shifting around it, so better to just get out the drill and replace the loose ones. So far I've found five rivets that I can grab with my fingers from below, and spin in their holes